Solas and Saehin are Dead
by ladymal
Summary: After being overrun in the Fallow Mire, Solas and Saehin come back from the dead. The continuing adventures of the reluctant zombies, Solas and Saehin Lavellan.
1. Chapter 1

Summary: After being overrun in the Fallow Mire, Solas and Saehin come back from the dead. Zombie AU for Solas Fluff Friday. Solavellan.

* * *

Her last memory just before the corpse dragged her under is of Solas being run through with a sword.

Saehin remembered other things too, of course. How the air stank of sickness and death that the near-constant rain never seemed able to wash away. Iron Bull swinging his axe in wide sweeps as he tried to reach her through the swarm. Cole's calling out their names, his voice high with despair. The way the water felt—slimy and cold and horrible—as it filled her lungs. It was all with her but watching Solas die…That one was the clearest.

She sighed but it came out more like a drawn out gurgle. It was hard to know exactly how long ago that had been but she imagined it as only a few days at most. Neither her or Solas looked too dreadful; her skin was sallow and bloated and he was still finding maggots in his belly but they were still mostly intact. She wasn't sure what it mattered but she supposed that if they were going to inhabit their own corpses then it was best if they weren't leaving a trail of body parts behind them.

Solas was standing by the lake—looking rather forlornly out over the water, she thought— so she walked over to him and somewhat clumsily placed her hand on his shoulder. It got his attention but it was also the deathblow for her littlest finger. It broke off, tumbling down his water-logged robes and landing in the lake with a plop. For a moment, they both simply stared in stunned silence. Then Solas leaned down, fished it out, and presented it to her.

Not sure what else to do, she accepted it and tried putting it back onto her hand. Bone ground and flesh squished but it remained stubbornly detached. Solas watched her struggle then fumbled it away from her and gave it a go. She would have rolled her eyes if she wasn't worried that they'd pop right out of the sockets but she didn't move as he twisted and wiggled her finger into position. It stayed for a breath, teetering on the edge, before the stress was too much and it threw itself back into the lake.

This time, they left it to feed whatever fish had been taking nibbles in the first place.

"I think it was the Breach," Saehin said.

Well, attempted to say, at least. The words were garbled and more like differently pitched moans than speech but Solas' blink—first one lid and then the other dragging behind—seemed to indicate some understanding.

"We're back because of the Breach," she reiterated with a gesture at the cloud-covered sky, just in case.

At first—before she had realized that Solas was technically alive, too—she had assumed that it was the Anchor that had brought her back. It hasn't stopped glowing and spitting green fire since she'd woken up so she still thought it was due some of the blame but obviously it hadn't acted alone. Solas would be doing a much more convincing job of being dead, otherwise.

"That is likely the cause, yes," he said or she thought he did. If possible, he sounded even more unintelligible than she had.

"We should find an Inquisition camp. The Anchor is active and maybe if I close the Breach for good, we'll stay dead next time."

A noise wheezed out of his throat, a hacking cough that it took her a moment to realize was actually a laugh. "One can always hope."

He began to shuffle his way to the road but she stopped him with another smack to his shoulder. All pieces of her remained attached and she let out a gurgle with relief. There was something she wanted to do and it would have been completely ruined if she'd had to go poking about for another finger. He turned back and before he knew what was happening, she crashed her lips into his.

It was more like a kiss between two dead fish than two people but Saehin didn't care. She had been wanting to do it for a long time and she figured that this would be the last chance she'd ever get. When she staggered away from him, Solas was gaping at her, one side of his face sagging slightly. She would have been blushing if she'd had any blood left in her but she didn't so she wasn't and she thought there was at least one benefit to being a corpse.

The silence had stretched too long so she started to shuffle by, embarrassment making what remained of her stomach twist into knots. She was almost past him when his hand latched onto hers, his grip unexpectedly strong. Smiling crookedly at her, he threaded their fingers together as best he could and squeezed. A fluttery, warm feeling filled her empty spaces and it was almost like she had never died at all.

She smiled back at him and together they limped off in search of the Inquisition.


	2. Chapter 2

Solas didn't know quite what to make of being dead.

He was still in a bit of shock, he supposed, so the true import of it had yet to sink in. Once it did, he imagined that he would feel thoroughly depressed about the whole situation but for the moment, he focused on slowly carving his message into a damp log. _Dear Ser or Madam, the Inquisitor and I are experiencing an unfortunate and unforeseen consequence of the Breach. While our appearance will no doubt be alarming to you, we ask that you refrain from the natural reaction of killing us..._

Next to him, Saehin was writing something similar onto her own log. She seemed to be taking it all well. It was difficult to be sure—her skin was waxy and stiff with bloat so facial expressions were generally nonexistent—but she was as spirited and determined as ever judging by the furious way she was stabbing at the wood. It was no less than he would have expected of her. Even before they had developed a friendship, he had known her to have a strong, willful personality not quickly daunted. Still, he wouldn't have thought less of her if she had been.

It was one thing to die and quite another to be forced back into one's day-old corpse.

"I'm finished," Saehin said as she dropped the sharp rock she'd been using as a knife into the soggy earth.

After arguing for the better part of a day, Solas had an easier time understanding her garbled speech and for once, he did not require her to repeat herself. "May I?" he asked.

With a bit more force than he thought strictly necessary, she shoved the log his way. He fumbled it closer and peered at the roughly carved letters. They were, as one might say, completely fucking illegible.

It wasn't terribly surprising; neither of them had the most stellar of motor-control and Saehin's dominant hand also happened to be missing a finger. He had mentioned this when she first suggested sending the Inquisition a message and had subsequently offered to be the one to write it. It was this that sparked their argument to begin with but it had quickly devolved into being more about neither of them understanding a word the other was saying. Still, Solas couldn't help but feel a small amount of smug amusement now that he had been proven correct.

Apparently sensing his thoughts, Saehin was giving him a hard stare. Though the effect was somewhat ruined by the aimless drifting of one eye, he was properly quelled and wisely decided to hold his tongue on the matter.  
He puffed out a weak cough and flopped his hand at his own work. "I am nearly finished, as well."

"Let me see it."

The log was passed over and she eyed the neat writing critically. As the silence stretched on, a strange, rigid expression began to take over her face and he felt a grin pulling at the oddly soft flesh of his mouth.

"Shut up," she gurgled.

"I said nothing."

"You were _thinking_ it, you—"

With a suddenness that surprised even him, Cole popped into existence in front of them with a happy smile. "You're back!"

Saehin startled and before anyone knew it, a log— _his_ log, he noted—was flying through the air straight for Cole. He ducked, his backside smacking into the mud, and the piece of wood went over his head and into the swampy underbrush beyond. Solas let out a rattling sigh as he watched hours of painstaking effort sail away. _Fenedhis_.

"Oh..." Cole looked between them. "Sorry..."

"Do not concern yourself, Cole." To his irritation, Solas' cheek was sagging— _again_ —and he pushed it back into place. "It was unlikely to have the desired effect anyway."

"I was wondering when you would find us," Saehin said, calm now that her initial urge to murder had subsided. "Is the Iron Bull alright?"

"Guilt like he'd swallowed a pot of snakes. Can't sleep from the dreams. _I should have done something_. He hurts because he thinks he should have been able to save you." Cole smiled. "He'll feel better now."

"Right," she said as dryly as her waterlogged lungs could manage. "Anyone would be cheered by their friends coming back as corpses."

"Are you not?" Solas asked, raising his brow playfully.

"Never been cheerier."

He chuckled at her deadpan tone, making Cole blink owlishly at them, confused. "Why is it funny that you're sad?"

"Sometimes, it's either laugh or throw oneself off the nearest tower and I'm not convinced that the latter would work," Saehin told them as she levered onto her rather uncooperative feet. "Now, Cole. You are just what I have been hoping for."

"I am?"

She jerked her head into what Solas assumed was meant to be a nod. "The Inquisition is more likely to listen to you over a bit of soggy wood that gets thrown at them."

"They are?"

"Yes."

She made that nodding motion again but this time her chin stayed oddly tilted and Solas realized that it had gotten stuck. Standing—or lurching, really—he carefully gripped her jaw and pushed her head back into its proper place with a scraping of bone. She clumsily patted his face in thanks before he stepped back with a nod if his own.

Eyes wide beneath his hat, Cole was looking between them as he switched between their thoughts. Solas had no doubt that he was thoroughly pleased by this particular turn of events though Solas himself hadn't quite decided. He cared for her more than he would have ever expected but considering everything that had happened...Well, it was all rather much to process.

Saehin did not seem to notice the spirit's preoccupation and went on to explain her plan. "This is what you are going to do..."


	3. Chapter 3

Sheltered under a drooping tree, Solas and Saehin watched from their hillock some distance away as the vague shadows that were Cole and the Inquisition guard, respectively, spoke. He had to squint to see them at all and chose to believe that it was from the return of the rain that, in truth, it had never actually stopped. In the Fallow Mire, it was always raining just at different strengths of misery. Regrettably damp, unpleasantly wet, and completely, horribly drenched. Since they had 'awoken', it had been flitting anxiously between all three and as such, Saehin and him were starting to mold.

The bandage that secured his middle—make-shift and rather slimy—was slipping and he plucked at it through his robes. At some point during their hike towards the Inquisition camp, the wound that cut through his belly and straight to his back had admitted defeat and gaped open. He had only been able to stare—stunned and more than a little horrified—at the glistening innards that had spilled out. Saehin, however, had been thoroughly unperturbed. She'd shoved it all back in in a somewhat haphazard manner then tried to heal the opening with magic. The spell had refused to stick, sliding off of him like water over oil, so she'd tied it up with the velvet sash she'd had around her waist instead.

 _That was...impressive_ , he'd told her once he had found his voice. _Thank you_.

 _Yours are not the first intestines I've had to replace_. She'd blinked sluggishly then and her eyes had rolled back into her head as if eager for a nap. _It's really just, 'grab a handful and in you go'._

Solas hadn't known what to say to that.

Something was shifting with a wet squish in his middle and he was just considering retying the bandage when an arrow thudded into his chest just over his heart. It made him stagger—enough so that Saehin latched onto his arm with surprising strength—but it wasn't painful. Not precisely. It felt strange, certainly, and continued the day's trend of making him uncomfortably aware of the disgusting, soft parts that made up his body, but nothing more. There was a stretch of silence as the two of them stared at the arrow shaft sticking out of him and still thrumming from energy before Saehin spoke.

"Are you..." she trailed off, apparently struggling to find the word for what they were supposed to be, and a bit of thick drool dribbled out of her open mouth.  
Using his sleeve, his wiped her chin for her. It removed the drool but it also left a streak of filth which refused to be cleaned no matter how he scrubbed at it. She eventually smacked his hand away in irritation but accepted his apologetic look with a squeeze of his fingers.

"Hurt?" she said finally.

"I do not believe so." Still, he did his best to remain motionless. The scrape of metal and wood against flesh and bone was really very unsettling. "There is no pain, at least."

In the Inquisition camp, he could see the two shadows begin to wrestle accompanied by some high-pitched yelling. Cole trying to stop the guard from peppering them with any more arrows, presumably.

"Should we leave it in?"

Solas considered. It was uncomfortable but he didn't seem to be in any danger. If they pulled it out, the barbed arrowhead would leave a hole not easily sealed and he was having enough trouble keeping his insides where they belonged as it was.

"I think," he said finally, "that it would be best to leave it to someone with steadier hands, a suture kit, and a very sharp knife."

"Who might that be?" she asked with a look at the chaos going on in the camp.

Others had joined in now and while it wasn't quite a brawl, tensions were clearly running high. There seemed to be some sort of struggle going on and people were shouting. More than a few of them seemed to be looking their way and he shifted as Saehin went very still. It hadn't occurred to him before but they were both very vulnerable at the moment. Death had granted them an unusual amount of durability but he didn't doubt that with enough persistence, the Inquisition soldiers could cut them down. They wouldn't be able to escape either; their fastest pace seemed to be a sort of shambling walk interspersed with abrupt lunges as they tripped over their own feet.

Solas was about to suggest a retreat—the guard from before looked to have wrested their bow back from Cole and was aiming their way—when a large, horned shadow appeared behind the crowd and called things to a stand-still. The Iron Bull. A form he thought was Cole darted over and swayed and paced in front of him.

In retrospect, Cole should have gone straight to Iron Bull and made their case instead of trying to get them into camp. It was the obvious solution and something cold and anxious slithered down his spine at the realization. Neither him or Saehin were prone to making such foolish tactical decisions or of making the mistakes he could now see piling up behind them. That they had...

At his side, Saehin seemed to be coming to the same conclusion and the way her eyes widened was a bit gruesome. "Are we...Have our..."

She couldn't quite get the words out and he felt a similar unease keeping him from fully forming the thought. _Have our minds been...?_

"Let us avoid hasty conclusions," he said, as much for himself as for her. "Any diminishment of our mental capabilities can be easily attributed to the stress of the last few days."

She was quiet and Solas got the distinct impression that she was unconvinced. That was understandable given that he remained unconvinced himself.

Below them, Cole and the Iron Bull had broken off from the group and were headed their way. Bull had drawn his greatsword and Solas did his best to seem as little like an undead elf as possible. It took a bit of effort but he straightened his back and arranged his face into something resembling normal. To his chagrin, Saehin wasn't bothering with such things and stood there as slump-shouldered and slack-jawed as ever.

The Iron Bull stopped several feet away, holding his sword guardedly but not yet ready to attack, while Cole hovered uncertainly between them. Brows drawn together and mouth hard, Bull didn't appear particularly receptive to listening but Solas hadn't exactly thought he would be.

He dipped his chin into a polite nod. "Iron Bull."

His attempt at decorum failed horribly when his jaw sagged half-way through and the rest of the greeting was swallowed completely by a droning moan. Iron Bull glanced between him and Saehin and shifted his stance, preparing to strike. Before he could lunge, Cole threw himself in the middle with eyes wide with desperation.

"They're them! Not other! Dark nothingness and then it was pulling. Stretching. Pushing back into shape," Cole said and his voice took on a bit of misery. "They don't want to be here."

"Yeah," Bull rumbled, the muscles in his shoulders bunching as if he was preparing to shove the spirit out of the way. "That doesn't rule them out as being demons, kid."

At that, Saehin began fumbling at her neck and the Iron Bull shifted defensively. With some work, she managed to slip something over her head and present it to him. Solas looked at it curiously and realized it was a dragon tooth, made into a necklace with a mildewy leather thong and glistening bright in the rain. He was puzzled but Iron Bull was staring and his eye flashed with something unknown. After a moment, he looked back at Saehin's face and then sheathed his sword.

"Shit. The Qun's going to really fucking love this one."


	4. Chapter 4

Iron Bull was very careful to not get too close to them.

 _And to stay upwind_ , Saehin thought. Other than to help snap off some of the arrow shaft that was still in Solas' chest, he maintained a strict four foot distance. He never looked directly at them either but always over their heads or beyond their shoulders or even up at the sky if he had to. Currently, he was sitting on a rock several feet away with his gazed fixed on she had no idea what. She couldn't blame him but his behavior was still a perfectly legitimate reason for her to feel increasingly put out.

That and Solas' absolute refusal to stop moving.

"Be still," she snapped and added a glare down at him for good measure.

They were a few days into their trek to Skyhold and they had finally escaped the Fallow Mire for the Hinterlands. It was a warm, sunny day and it hadn't taken long for clouds of foul-smelling vapor to start wafting from the two of them as they dried out. It was a relief to know that she wouldn't be toting half the bog with her for the rest of her existence but it also had the unfortunate side-effect of making them a little, well... _flabby_. By early afternoon, her sash around Solas' middle had quit the job and his insides had been taking full advantage of it ever since.

She might have just replaced the bandage _and_ his insides then kept on but the Iron Bull had looked positively faint the second time Solas' intestines had dropped onto the road.

"It is not voluntary," Solas retorted and she imagined that the extra wrinkles in his forehead and the sagging of the corner of his mouth were meant to be a scowl but frankly, it was a bit hard to tell. "You are suturing up a wound and insist on sewing my innards up with it!"

Well, that was true but it was nearly impossible to do otherwise, all things considered. Not that she was about to admit to any such thing.

"You can't even feel it!" she said.

"As I have explained numerous times," he lifted a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose and poked himself in the eye instead, "that there is no pain is not the same thing as not having any sensation."

Saehin grit her teeth and after a beat— "Did you hurt your eye?"

Sighing, he let his hand drop. "No."

There was a brief silence that was broken by Cole's quiet voice. "See? They're still them. Clashing then breaking smooth and still. Knowing that the other cares. You don't have to be sad. Or think that it's your fault. They don't blame you."

Iron Bull coughed, a ragged sound from deep in his chest. "Thanks, kid. Doesn't really help but...thanks."

The silence was a good deal heavier this time and when the gibbering horror burst from the trees and tried to devour her face, she was rather grateful.

Instinct had her casting a barrier before she'd truly registered what was happening. It knocked her onto her back but its jagged teeth skimmed off her without doing any harm. Then an armored foot was kicking it off of her and a greatsword was cleaving it in two and it was dead.

Solas—shirt bunched up around the broken arrow sticking out of his sternum and the needle and thread dangling from his half-closed belly—pulled her back upright and looked her over. The eye that he had poked was bulging slightly so she eased it back into the socket for him and was morbidly fascinated by the way it squished under her finger. _This sort of thing has become bizarrely routine_ , she thought.

"A rift must be nearby," he said, blinking as his eye settled. "I am surprised you did not sense it."

"It is the Anchor that reacts to it," she told him with an accusing glance down at her marked hand.

It had yet to stop crackling and flashing and generally making a nuisance of itself since they'd returned to their bodies. Any fluctuations caused by a rift were lost in the tiny magical storm contained in her palm. She was rapidly beginning to hate the traitorous bastard.

"Lay back down," she said. "I'll finish the stitches and we can go close it."

"Yeah. Hold up." Bull said, sheathing his sword and for once looking directly at Saehin. It was to give her the stink eye but still, she considered it progress. "Before you two decide that fighting demons and closing rifts is a great fucking idea, consider that neither of you actually have control over your own limbs."  
"We do," Saehin protested and waved at the sutures she'd made as evidence. Her hand lurched instead, almost ending up buried in Solas' stomach, and sabotaged her point entirely.

She went on, pointedly ignoring what had just happened and Solas' rather wry expression about it. "It will be fine."

"Right. Because _that_ was convincing." Iron Bull snorted and turned to Cole. "Back me up here, kid."

"Oh..." Cole glanced between them all uncertainly as he rocked on his heels and wrung his hands. He looked very much like he would prefer to be anywhere else.

"It is most likely a very small rift," she said before Cole could hurt himself with indecision. "If it isn't and there are too many demons, then we will leave."

"I only understood about half of that and it still sounded like bullshit."

"It wasn't," she assured him with a try at a smile as Solas croaked a chuckle beside her.

* * *

As expected, the rift was small. It was nestled in a wide gully and from above Saehin could see a small group of minor demons milling about. She felt very...strange looking at it. Like the blood she no longer had was pushing against her veins; being drawn to it like lodestone was to iron. The feeling got worse the closer they approached and by the time she was near enough to use the Anchor, she thought her skin would rip under the strain.

"Solas and I will stay here," she reaffirmed.

Iron Bull grunted but moved off with Cole in tow to deal with the demons while Solas and her remained on the ridge. The rift was loud, cracking and hissing with energy, but louder still—more _real_ —were ugly voices speaking to her from the other side of the rift. _Demons_ , was her first thought but there was something about them that wasn't right. They were _familiar_.

Shuddering, she turned to Solas. "Do you...?"

He nodded and gazed speculatively at the rift. "A slight pulling sensation. Curious."

There was nothing _slight_ about it and Saehin was about to say so when an arc of light—bright green and brilliant—snapped out of the rift. It sped straight for her and hit her in the chest. If she thought she'd felt strange before, it was nothing compared to now. It was displacement. She was there and not there. Real and not real. She could hear Solas, his words sharp with alarm, see the others as they fought the demon, feel her own deadened flesh but there were other things overlapping. Magic and thought and voices, voices, voices.

 _This is_ _ **mine**_ , they said and they were snatching and tearing at her, feral dogs at a scrap of meat. _Get out. Give it to me, me, ME!_

She tried to get away but there was nowhere to go. _Close it_. She lifted her hand and it jerked as if attached to a string. A thread of energy connected the Anchor to the rift with a crack. The voices screamed and cursed and she struggled to shut them back behind the Veil. The rift collapsed with a suddenness that stole the air with a rush and then there was silence in her own head once more.

Solas grabbed her arm as she sagged, that extra wrinkly frown back on his face. After a moment's hesitation, he tucked a strand of wild and slightly mildewy hair behind her ear and tenderly clasped the side of her neck.

"Are you hurt?"

She was panting as much as her defective body would allow but somehow she felt like she was running out of air. How that was possible when she actually didn't need to breathe anymore, she didn't know, but apparently it was. And there was pain. All over and all through her and coming from nowhere in particular. It reminded her of what it was like to die and it was the most alive she had felt in days. _Fuck, that is depressing._

The others had finished with the last of the demons and were jogging their way as Solas waited for an answer. She shook her head with a reassuring pat to his chest. "No."

And that was naturally the precise moment that she dropped dead.


	5. Chapter 5

She was...somewhere very terrible. It was dark but not. Infinite but not. Silent but echoing so loudly that it shattered her mind like glass. It was everything and nothing all at once and Saehin thought that this must be the place that souls went to die.

After a moment that stretched out into an age, she realized that she wasn't alone. There were things like people surrounding her, pressing in, _reaching_. She had no eyes to see them with but she knew that they were there. They were hate and rage; familiar voices that slithered around her like living things that bit and ate at the flesh of her very self. Their words tumbled over one another, a thousand voices speaking and screaming and forcing her to hear.

 _Thi—it belongs—ef—to_ _ **me**_ _—mine—get—give it to—out—thief!—mine—_ _ **it is mine!**_

A shadow of a person with teeth like knives and grasping, ripping hands launched itself out of the nothing-everything. It was coming for her. It was going to—It wanted—. She lifted her hand to ward it off as a poisonous green light burned like the sun—

Slamming back into her body was like being smacked by a dragon and a rattling moan puffed out of her gaping mouth. Deep, aching pain throbbed and she felt rather betrayed by it. _Be dead quietly_ , she thought at her body. _It is the least you can do_. Her eyes had already been open and three familiar faces were hovering above her, framed by painfully bright sunlight. It took her a beat to notice the sharp tip of a greatsword digging into her throat, apparently ready to take off her head.

"Get off," she croaked.

"Gotta know what's come back first, boss," Iron Bull rumbled, his expression hard but also unhappy.

She thought Solas was looking appropriately serious, as well, but one side of his face was doing its best to slide off his skull again and it somewhat ruined the effect. Discreetly as she could, she tapped her cheek until he seemed to catch on and hurriedly prodded his face back into place.

"She's herself but different. A few more pieces chipped away. It pulled and stretched and took her somewhere else. They wanted what she has," Cole was saying quietly, his gaze distant, and then he blinked and focused on her. "They hated you very much."

"Yes, thank you for the insight, Cole," she murmured as the other two relaxed.

Iron Bull stepped back and sheathed his sword while Solas bent somewhat unsteadily to offer her his hand. She accepted it and was rather surprised by how warm it was. Warm and humming with life that neither of them truly had any longer. The pervading ache she had been feeling receded but whether it was his touch that had done it, was a matter of debate.

"As unpleasant as it may be for you," Solas said as he pulled on her hand to help her up, "I am relieved that you have returned. For several reasons."

Saehin peered at his small smile through her lashes, reaching out to touch him as she was lifted off the ground, and—

With a rip and a pop, her arm came away from her body, coat sleeve and all. She teetered on her heels, her left arm wind-milling for balance that seemed to have taken a holiday, and then she was falling onto her back with a gurgle of alarm.

There was a stunned silence, all of them gaping at the arm that was now in Solas' unwilling possession. He was still holding it as if it continued to be attached to her and it stuck out into the air like especially macabre statue. It was even holding him back, apparently having disregarded the new development entirely.

"That...that did not just happen," she said. It hadn't even had the decency to put on a show of a fight. Or to even _hurt_. It just abandoned ship without so much as a _by your leave_. "That—I _refuse_ to accept that that just happened."

Solas coughed and gently laid her arm on the grass. It clung to him stubbornly but with a few shakes, he managed to get it to let go. To her disbelief, his lips were twitching as he did. _If you are laughing, Solas, I swear that I will find a way to kill you_. He crouched at her armless side and with a hand on her back and Cole's help, he got her onto her feet.

"Refusing its occurrence will not be helpful, I'm afraid. Recognition and solutions—" Solas choked, letting out another cough, and she gave him a murderous look with the one eye that accepted the job.

"Go hand in hand!" Bull finished and then guffawed loud enough to startle a few birds from the trees.

Covering his mouth, Solas turned away from her slightly with a snort.  
"Oh, it's funny because they were holding hands!" Cole said, pleased with himself for figuring it out.

That sent Solas over the edge and he began to chuckle, his eyes crinkling. Saehin tried to remain staunch in her ire but soon enough she was laughing, too.

"All of this is just too ridiculous," she said and lifted what was now her only hand— _the one with the Anchor, naturally_ , she thought with only a _hint_ of bitterness— to her forehead. She, of course, slapped herself instead.

"That doesn't quite cover it, boss," Iron Bull said, grinning crookedly. "Try 'the weirdest fucking shit.'"

To her surprise, Iron Bull had yet to look away and was still standing closer to her and Solas than he had in days. Dying for a second time suddenly didn't seem quite so horrible. Even if it had cost her a perfectly good arm.


	6. Chapter 6

Taking the mountain pass that would carry them to Skyhold was about as troublesome as Saehin had imagined. After over a week in the sun, Solas and her had dried out fully. Their skin had turned leathery and thick, their speech was somewhat more intelligible, and they had even regained a little more mobility. That was quite gone now and they were about as unwieldy as a couple of rather horrible ice statues.

 _Well, no,_ she corrected herself. _Horrible is a bit strong. Macabre. Unpleasant. Mildly uncomfortable to look at_. It helped that they were no longer in the robes that they died in. They had dropped in on the last Inquisition camp before the Frostbacks started in earnest and acquired thick wool clothing and linen bandages for them to wrap their faces with. Or rather, Iron Bull and Cole had while she and Solas had lurked, off in the distance. The gear kept them from freezing solid, as well, as long as they were continuously spelled with warmth. A task that had fallen to her when Solas had nearly set them both on fire. If she squinted, she thought she could still see wisps of smoke curling up from under his hood.

Something clutched her ankle through the snow—vice-like and much too fleshy—and Saehin jumped and let out a thick, wordless shout. Without thinking, she tried to beat it off with her detached limb before realizing that it was, in fact, the limb grabbing at her. She wobbled, having thrown herself off-balance and would have fallen into the snow if Solas hadn't steadied her with his hands on her shoulders. As he kept her stable, she kicked and stomped at her rogue hand until it released her with a sullen curl of its fingers. If it could have, she thought the thing would be hissing.

He tugged down the strips of cloth that covered his face so that he could speak then reached over and did hers, too.

"Perhaps you might hold your arm in some other manner," he said. His face was trying to form a frown but was struggling slightly with getting the somewhat frosty flesh to cooperate. "It seems to attempt to trip you with astonishing frequency."

"Never," she grunted and lifted the arm so that she could give it a proper glare.  
Iron Bull glanced at the raised limb as he passed and muttered something before stomping on his way.

"It is yours, lethallan," Solas said dryly. His hands were still on her shoulders and he didn't seem inclined to remove them any time soon. That pleased her immensely, she decided. "You do not need to concern yourself with defeating it."

 _I very much_ _ **do**_ _but you just never mind that_ , she thought, remembering how the thing had completely lost all sense of social boundaries. A sense that had always been shaky to begin with but truly was nothing short of shameful, now. She couldn't even have said what her arm and hand had been trying to do the previous night when they began inching their way towards an oblivious Solas. She'd caught it before anyone had noticed and she wasn't about to give it the idea that it could just do whatever it pleased, thank you.

"Independence has given it a mind of its own," was all she said.

He hummed brokenly, something between the usual gurgle and the cracking of ice. "I will carry it for you, if you wish."

"No," she said and once again she was happy to know that death had stolen all ability for her to blush. "No, it's fine."

"As you like."

With a small nod, he made to step away from her. He had barely managed to let go of her shoulders before her detached hand was making a grab for him. Saehin jerked it back—her eyes bulging in horror—but it was much more determined than expected and she ended up toppling into Solas' chest as it latched onto his collar. He caught her by the hips and they both froze as her hand crept up to cradle his cheek.

Though they had touched plenty in the days since their deaths, they had strictly avoided anything approaching their kiss. Through mutual awkwardness, they had silently resolved to never discuss it. To sweep it under the rug like a particularly hairy dust bunny, as it were. Which made it all terribly awkward, of course, now that her independent limb seemed to have decided that it had had quite enough of such things.

"Ah," she said. The corner of her mouth was listing and she could feel a string of thick drool escape but at the moment, she was much more concerned about how she was groping Solas' face. "Just let me—"

He lurched forward suddenly and then his lips were on hers and she entirely forgot whatever it was she'd meant to say. It was cold and rather stiff but Saehin melted all the same. The longer they touched, the more she started to notice...warmth. Light and bright and brilliant warmth. It spread through her like sunshine or laughter or the comfort of another's arms around her. Solas' hands moved to bury themselves in her hair and she thought he must feel the same. The feeling grew and grew until it was almost overwhelming in its intensity and they had to separate.

"Fascinating," he said, sounding somewhat awed.

"We should study it," she told him, her tone serious even as a grin threatened to overtake her. "It might be useful."

He laughed as he wiped the drool off her face. Some of it had been transferred to him and her disconnected hand was kindly doing the same for him. _You've certainly gotten what you wanted, haven't you?_ she thought at it, too content to be irritated with the thing.

"It is worthy of such attention," he agreed.

"Oh, yes," she said and her smile finally broke free.


	7. Chapter 7

It was several days of travel before they spotted Skyhold off in the distance. At their slow, lumbering pace, it would take them at least another day to reach it but it was something of a relief to Solas to know they were near. The idea of returning to the keep and its occupants after all that had happened was actually quite a happy one despite his uncertainty of how they would be received. _The comfort of the familiar_ , he thought and decided that it was not such a bad thing.

Sometime the next morning, they came in sight of the Inquisition's army camped in the valley beneath Skyhold. They had managed to avoid other travelers to the keep thus far through luck and caution but it would be impossible from then on. While the road did not pass through the encampment, it was in the open and there were no convenient places to hide should anyone think to investigate them.

Apparently, Iron Bull had been thinking along the same lines because he stopped and turned to Saehin.

"You, Solas, and Cole stay here. I'll go ahead and find you a carriage or something to take you the rest of the way."

Her detached limb was currently resting across Solas' shoulders—lounging like a content and terribly lazy cat—and so her left hand was free to pull her linens away from her face.

"Why?"

Solas couldn't determine whether her flat tone was out of suspicion, confusion, or irritation at being ordered about. Possibly all three.

Bull let out a sigh and it was heavy enough that Solas suspected it to be one that he'd been holding in for some time.

"Alright, boss. I'm gonna to say this gently 'cause I know this hasn't been easy for you. You're _walking fucking corpses_."

"Oh." She blinked then had to blink several more times when her eyes rolled back into her head. "Yes. I'd forgotten how strange it is."

Iron Bull barked out a laugh and shook his head. "Yeah, strange. That's what this is."

"Put a bit mildly, perhaps," Solas told him after freeing his mouth from his own wrappings, "but I find myself beginning to think of our current state as being normal as well."

"It's easier that way," Cole said with quiet understanding as he twisted his hands together. "Not horrible and wrong. Just a different way of being."

He looked between them and his voice became more forceful.

"You're not wrong. You're my friends and I won't let them hurt you."

Out of the corner of his eye, Solas could see Saehin shift and her severed hand twisted his tunic tightly as the fingers flexed. He reached up and pried the fabric free then stroked the hand soothingly.

"Thank you, Cole," he said.

The spirit's words were appreciated even if they made what was left of his stomach feel leaden with old guilt. Cole, he thought, would know of what it was to not belong in this world.

"Go then," Saehin told Iron Bull. "We'll wait here."

Bull hesitated but dropped his hand to her shoulder and squeezed it comfortingly. "Listen, you may be walking corpses but you're still _you_. I've got your back. Same as always."

She stared at him, her mouth slightly open and jaw hanging crookedly, and Bull closed his eye and seemed to take a fortifying breath. Coughing politely, Solas closed her mouth with a firm touch.

"Thank you," she said, presumably to both of them.

Bull turned to him next. "Yours too."

If his face was not rigid with frost and generally uninterested in doing what he told it to, it would have been an effort for Solas to keep his surprise away from it. He found himself feeling uncertain of what to do with this sudden gesture of friendship. He'd been aware that Iron Bull considered Saehin a friend—for whatever friendship with a qunari was actually worth—so his words were not wholly unexpected. That he offered the same to _Solas_ certainly was. Especially in light of their unusual circumstances when most would have killed the two of them long ago.

In the end, he only bowed his head in acknowledgment but it appeared to be accepted.

"Alright, kid." Bull looked at Cole as he let his hand fall from Saehin's shoulder. "Try to keep any more weird shit from happening to them while I'm gone."

" _Rifts and evil demon voices and her arm coming right off_ ," Cole said, his voice soft and his eyes distant beneath his hat. "T _hat arm is probably going to try to murder them next_. Do you think that's likely, The Iron Bull?"

"It is not," Solas assured him.

"Yeah." Bull grimaced and scrubbed at his face with an expression of having had enough of absolutely everything. "If it starts acting funny—shit, more than it already is—pin it to the ground and set it on fire. Got it?"

* * *

As they waited for Bull to return, they sat in the snow with their backs against a large rock that Cole had claimed as his perch. In the same way that they no longer required sleep or sustenance of any kind, they did not need to rest their legs but they sat down as they normally would. A poor facade that they had mutually and silently agreed to maintain.

Saehin's detached arm had moved so that it wouldn't be crushed between him and the rock and now lay next to him with its hand on his knee. She stared at it, her lips drooping into a frown.

"I can hold onto it if it's bothering you."

"That won't be necessary," Solas said.

"He likes it," Cole told her from his spot above them as he kicked his booted heels.

He sent the spirit a disapproving look that Cole only smiled at. Ever since the kiss they had shared, her arm had kept close and he couldn't find it in himself to mind in the slightest. If he was being honest with himself, he was actually rather pleased. Almost embarrassingly so. It had been a very long time since he'd experienced affection of any kind and it would be a lie to say that he had never imagined what _Saehin's_ affection would be like. He had. With great frequency and in much more detail than was strictly polite.

Regardless, concerning himself with the actions of Saehin's dismembered arm would have been a pointless exercise. It was clear that—for the moment, at least—the thing seemed to have escaped her control entirely and he would be suffering its attentions for the foreseeable future.

"Why is it...alive?" she asked.

"I don't believe that it is," he said with some relief. It seemed she would leave Cole's comment unremarked upon. "Not in the way that you're implying."

"It moves because I do."

"Yes." Solas smiled. The quickness of her mind never failed to impress him. So often she seemed to pluck his explanations straight from his head with how easily she grasped things. "We would not be able to move at all if not for magic of some form. It is only reasonable that a mere physical severing of body parts would do little."

With difficulty, the stiff flesh of her brow wrinkled and she shook her head. "I can't control it."

"Perhaps that is because you think of it as no longer being a part of you." His smile turned into a smirk and if it was a little self-satisfied, he could hardly be considered at fault. "It is a wall between it and you, as it were, that only your subconscious desires can pierce."

"Ah."

Her expression was pained in that specific way that had always accompanied a blush from cheek to ear and he huffed a laugh. It earned him a glare that made one of her eyes bulge slightly but she otherwise chose to ignore it.

"I hope that doesn't mean my lost finger is crawling through the Hinterlands," she said.

"It is likely to have been eaten by now."

"Well, that's something."

To his amusement, the hand on his knee was tapping its fingers rhythmically. A habit he had never seen her do and he could only assume it was one she usually suppressed.

"Do you think we made the right decision?" she asked.

"To return to Skyhold?" At her nod, he smiled. _Your thoughts jump like mountain goats, Saehin_ , he thought fondly. "We had little choice, in the end."

"Yes, but it seems like a terrible idea, now."

"You are most likely safe. The Anchor is still functional and they need it to close the rifts."

"Relatively. Until they do not," she said, her tone dry. "It was not myself I was worried about."

Solas was quiet for a moment as something raw and painfully content squirmed in his gut and he had the brief urge to check that some creature hadn't found its way inside. But no, it didn't feel quite the same as when he had been infested with maggots so he dismissed the idea.

"Thank you," he said and after only the most fleeting of hesitations, he took her attached hand in his.

As always, they fumbled slightly but with persistence, they had laced their fingers together. Her shy, happy grin had that raw something doing flips and his sense made a momentary return. _You are being exceptionally foolish_ , he told himself but in her presence, it was all too easy to forget why that should concern him. Her companionship, her comfort, everything that she was, was too tempting.

He thought back to their kiss. It had been very _real_ and not much like a kiss between two dead people, at all. Her lips had been very soft, for one, and he had smelled lavender soap and tasted sweet chocolate and hot peppers. And there had been warmth like life coursing through him in a way it hadn't since he had been killed.

 _It is only that taste of life. Who could truly expect to resist such a thing?_

He told himself this and as he looked into Saehin's eyes—only one of which was looking back at him; the other seemed to have found something of interest inside her skull—he knew himself to be the worst of liars. The truth of it was that he found this stubborn, clever, infuriating elf beautiful in an endless number of ways and he was more than half in love already.

"Her, too," Cole said, his boots _tap tapping_ against stone, and then he sighed happily. "This is good."

"What is?" Saehin asked, curious and a bit wary as was her won't.

" _Warm and safe. Breathing and not letting go_ ," Cole said and when Saehin's dismembered fingers tightened its grip on his knee, Solas realized the spirit was echoing her thoughts. " _A heart beating that isn't. I thought I knew it before. This is true lo_ —"

With impressive suddenness, the separated arm launched itself into the air and tried to clap its hand against Cole's mouth. It smacked his nose instead and he squawked. He teetered on his perch, arms flailing, and then toppled back and straight into the snow. There were some sputtering sounds and Saehin lurched to her feet before hobbling over. Solas followed more slowly but arrived to help her pull the spirit up.

"Are you hurt?" she asked as she slapped the snow out of Cole's hair.

"No. But your arm isn't very nice when it's not attached to you."

Said arm was now scurrying up Solas' leg to rest across his shoulders once more. Saehin glanced at it and something told him that she wasn't feeling terribly guilty about what it had done. Solas, for his part, had that pleased something growing like a tenacious weed and wrapping its tendrils around him in an only partially unwanted embrace. He watched her continue to brush Cole clean and he couldn't stop the smile from stretching his cheeks.

 _You are exceptionally foolish_ , he told himself again but then Saehin gave him a shy smile of her own and he wondered if, in this instance, foolishness was such a bad thing.


	8. Chapter 8

The mountains had been clothed in their evening shadows before Iron Bull returned in the driver's seat of the promised carriage. It was a somewhat alarming thing—rough and square with more than a few jagged holes in the wood—that rattled along the pass like a box full of teeth. Saehin wondered if she wouldn't be little more than a pile of body parts by the time they reached Skyhold. _Let us hope not_. If nothing else, she doubted anyone would take their claims of personhood terribly seriously at that point. Especially if the rest of her body parts shared her arm's penchant for...gropery.

"Is gropery a word?" she asked Solas as they helped each other lurch to their feet.

Blinking with an effort, he considered. Her arm had scrambled up his leg and chest to lie on his shoulders once more and he stroked the hand absently.

"I don't believe that it is."

"That is an appalling oversight."

His face did a strange thing where the whole upper half seemed to make an attempt at sliding up and off his skull but he didn't ask.

Bull pulled up the carriage nearby and the horses appeared to catch a whiff of them. They snorted and stamped their feet uneasily. He climbed down and soothed them with a few, surprisingly gentle touches as the carriage door opened. She blinked, one eye listing up into her head, when Cullen—hard-mouthed and grim—stepped out followed by an equally stony Vivienne. Saehin tensed. _The two most likely to immediately try to kill us. Lovely._

They weren't the only ones, however, and she was somewhat gratified to see Dorian pop out of the carriage last. His gaze went to her first but was almost immediately arrested—rather understandably, she thought—by the arrow still buried in Solas' chest and then her arm slung across his shoulders.

"So, it's true then," he said. "They're actually...dead."

"How unfortunate." Vivienne had her staff in hand as she considered the state of them. "I had rather hoped that you had crafted some sort of strange fabrication."

"That would be idiotic," she told her. "Why are you here?"

"Condition for bringing you two back to Skyhold, boss."

"You...understood that?" Dorian asked, seemingly equal parts appalled and bewildered at the idea.

Giving her a side-long smirk, Bull shrugged. "They do a lot of moaning at each other. Starts to make sense after a while."

Saehin glared at him but he only rumbled a chuckle and waggled his eyebrows. At her side, Solas wheezed.

"That was highly inappropriate," he said. "Under the circumstances, that would be—"

He stopped, apparently uncertain of just exactly _what_ he thought it would be.  
"Disgusting," she filled in. "The word you're looking for is, 'disgusting.'"

"Hey, now." Iron Bull looked at her disapprovingly. "No need to hurt the poor guy's feelings over it."

"Clearly, I've missed something." Dorian looked between the two of them, his nose wrinkling. "I can't imagine what or perhaps I simply don't want to. Either way—"

"They're not monsters!" Cole burst out from her side. He was staring at Cullen who had paused with his hand on his sword hilt and for the first time she'd ever seen, the spirit looked angry. "I won't let you hurt them!"

"No one's going to hurt them, kid," Bull said calmly though he, too, was watching both the Commander and Vivienne.

"That remains to be seen but I believe I have a way to help with our little dilemma," Dorian said. "There's a spell for determining whether an object has been possessed or otherwise subject to undue magical influences.

"Back home, it's used on things people would rather avoid the embarrassment of destroying. Expensive tomes, rare artifacts, priceless family heirlooms that stubbornly try to murder you in your sleep. That sort of thing. It doesn't work on the living, of course, but they don't exactly qualify anymore, do they?"

Saehin's jaw had grown stiff from the cold so she had to reach up and wiggle it loose before speaking. It crunched alarmingly enough for Solas to glance at her with his own jaw sagging in concern but it seemed no worse for it.

"What about walking corpses?"

Once Iron Bull had translated, Dorian glanced at her, grimaced, and then responded to the group at large.

"As one can imagine, I haven't spent much time attempting to preserve corpses—or any time, for that matter—but the principle should be the same."

"How reassuring," Vivienne drawled. "How much better I feel after such a stunning declaration of confidence."

"You can't honestly be suggesting that they could be anything _but_ possessed." Cullen shook his head, his hand visibly tight on his sword. "It's not possible."

"Oh, I don't know." Dorian's teeth flashed white as he gave a dry smile. "There's a giant hole in the sky threatening to destroy the whole world while an immortal, ancient magister tries to become a god. Resurrection seems almost tame in comparison."

He cast his spell then—not bothering with so much as a polite raise of an eyebrow in askance—and it danced around her and Solas as a cheery yellow wisp. It settled on her head briefly before shuddering like an outraged bird ruffling its feathers and flitting off to do the same to Solas. Then it moved to hover in front of them and after a moment of silent regard, disappeared with a giggling pop.

"Well, that settles that, I suppose. It's not every day you see two people come back from the dead. A little worse for wear but still. It's rather horribly fascinating, isn't it?"

"This is madness," Cullen said.

"I quite agree." Vivienne's eyes were chips of ice as she stared at her and Solas. "Your spell was very quaint, my dear, but ultimately useless when the accuracy is in such doubt. These demons do passable impersonations—the Inquisitor's vacant expression is very like her, I grant you—but they are still _demons_."

From Solas' shoulder, Saehin's dismembered hand made a wonderfully rude gesture at the First Enchanter and she had to restrain the urge to join in for added potency. Her hand seemed to sense the desire and made another—rather more elaborately filthy—motion as if to fill in.

"Last I checked," Dorian stroked his mustache as his eyes crinkled in amusement, "demons possessing corpses don't speak or...pantomime so colorfully before engaging in cannibalistic murder."

There was a stirring in the Veil near Solas and Saehin started, jerking her head to look. He wasn't moving—his expression calm—and no one other than Cole seemed to take note of the disturbance. She ripped her gaze away before anyone _did_ decide to take note and gathered her own mana quietly, quietly in preparation. Admittedly, she would feel terribly later if this ended in a fight—well, if it ended in a fight with _Dorian_ , anyway—but she wasn't about to let them go and chop off Solas' head, either.

 _Things seem to be quickly spiraling in that direction_ , she thought with a glare. It became especially gruesome when her eye popped out a little with the force of it. She felt a burst of satisfaction when Cullen turned green.

"They may _appear_ harmless but I would think that you of all people, darling, would know better than to be taken in. It is time we put an end to this nonsense and—"

Whatever Vivienne was going to suggest—which she strongly suspected ended with some version of, _kill the demons_ —was left forever unknown when her eyes rolled back into her head and she dropped face-first into the snow. For an instant, no one moved as the Enchanter let out a horribly undignified snore but then Cullen seemed to catch on to what had happened.

He cursed. Cole appeared in front of him like a ghost and Saehin wrapped barriers around him and Solas as best she could without a staff. She could feel a smite brewing as Cullen began to draw his weapon. She steeled herself but it turned out that she'd never had cause to worry.

In the next moment, Dorian was swinging his staff at the Commander's head and there was a crack of wood against bone. Cullen reeled and then Solas was casting another sleep spell and he joined Vivienne in snowy slumber.  
The air was charged with magic and adrenaline and they all took a breath to absorb the implications of what they'd just done.

"Shit," Iron Bull said as he let his hand fall from the hilt of his greatsword. "We're never going to get you two accepted back into Skyhold, now."


End file.
